An epic tale of one self-published author's journey to promote his works…

The official blog of D.M. Andrews, writer.
D.M. Andrews has been drawing maps, writing stories, and coming up with weird ideas since the age of twelve. Although fantasy features in most of his writing, D.M. Andrews also has a keen passion for history. He enjoys writing for all confident readers, whatever their age...

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I’ve just finished a KDP Select campaign for my debut novel, The Serpent in the Glass. One of the reasons for running the campaign was to see the effect compared to past promo campaigns. In short, could KDP still deliver a solid punch if done properly?

1. Preparation

Firstly I should say that my book, The Serpent in the Glass, had 48 reviews with a 4.2 average rating as of campaign start. The cover appeals to both young and old, probably around age 9+. Campaign ran from Fri 22 – Sun 24 March 2013.

I contacted (mainly by filling out forms) over 30 sites that you can notify, for free, about your free promotions on Amazon Kindle. This doesn’t mean they will list your promotions, but some will. You need to start doing this about 3 weeks before your campaign runs.

I spent somewhere in the region of about $200 on various services, including a book-tweeting service and two modest adverts in a couple of the high-profile sites.

2. The Campaign

I tweeted, retweeted and replied to personal tweeters as they appeared. I tried to use some @ and # on twitter to help visibility, though I’m not very good at that. I posted on a dozen or more facebook groups.

3. The Results

12 hours into the first day: 4117 downloads and ranked at #111
16 hours into the first day: 7675 downloads and ranked at #30
Start of second day: 10,896 downloads and ranked at #10
4 hours into second day: ranking at #7 (PEAK)
6 hours into second day: ranking drops to #9
12 hours into second day: 13,469 downloads and ranked at #9
16 hours into second day: 14,382 downloads and ranked at #14
Start of third day: 15,392 downloads and ranked at #16
8 hours into third day: 15,882 downloads and ranked at #16
14 hours into third day: 16,680 downloads and ranked at #16
End of third day and campaign: 17,561 downloads and ranked at #37 (first-page position lost )

One more question. You do KDP giveaways, but that means you’re in Select, which means you’re excluded from selling your books in other channels (Smashwords etc). Are you un/happy about missing out on that distribution?

Only two of my books are in Select currently. I’ve not experienced much in the way of sales outside of Kindle, to be honest, though I do have some distributed via Smashwords simply because it gives more exposure. I tend to focus on Kindle.